Systems and methods for identifying a media asset from an ambiguous audio indicator

ABSTRACT

Systems and methods are disclosed herein for identifying a media asset in response to an ambiguous input. The media guidance application may detect a portion of music provided by a user, e.g., a melody from user humming. The media guidance application may retrieve information about the user&#39;s location for a predetermined time period prior to detecting the portion of music. The media guidance application may then determine content accessible by the user at the location, e.g., a commercial played at a display screen at a train station when the user was waiting for the train, to identify the media asset corresponding to the user humming.

BACKGROUND

Some existing media systems may perform an audio search to identify amedia asset. Conventionally, some media systems may capture a music tunethat is played in the environment, and identify the name of a songcorresponding to the music tune. The music search performed byconventional systems, however, requires that (1) the input of the audiosearch, i.e., usually a segment of the music tune, is well-identifiableand of high quality; and (2) the music to be identified is stored as amusic item at a music database. For example, when a user is at a recordstore, and uses his or her user device to record a segment of the musicbeing played from the audio speaker, the media system may be able toperform the audio search by comparing characteristics of the recordedsegment and characteristics of a stored segment of music to identifywhat song was being played. When the audio search indicator isambiguous, e.g., a user humming a music tune that may be inaccurate withthe original music tune, or when the music tune is not pre-stored in themusic database as a music item, e.g., an impromptu melody sung by acharacter in the television show, conventional media systems are unableto identify what the media asset it is. In addition, the music searchperformed by the existing media systems is often oblivious of anyuse-specific preference or background information, and may not identifya version of the music or media asset that the user prefers.

SUMMARY

The advancement of digital transmission of media content has increasedthe amount of data that can be transmitted. For example, high definitionmedia assets usually involve a large volume of video data to bedelivered from a media source to user equipment for display. Inparticular, media systems may transmit metadata that includes detailedinformation about media content. This metadata may include descriptionsand tags to important events within the media asset. While thisinformation, by itself, is not useable for displaying to a human user,computer processors can read and interpret this information. However,while computer processors may read and interpret this information, andgenerate media content for display that may be useable by a human user(e.g., output media content to match with a captured music tune), thesesystems still fail to solve the aforementioned problem when implementedin computer systems because: (i) as discussed above, these computersystems can only perform audio search of a music tune when the musictune is of high quality; and (ii) even if a user can theoreticallylisten to media assets stored in a database, and mentally decide whetherthe media asset the user is listening to is a match that the user wastrying to find, given the volume of media assets stored in a media assetdatabase, it is impractical and basically impossible for a user tomanually identify a media asset based on an input of music tune.

Accordingly, to overcome the problems created when performing audiosearch to identify a music tune, systems and methods are disclosedherein for identifying a media asset based on an ambiguous searchindicator provided by a user.

Specifically, the media guidance application may detect a portion ofmusic provided by a user, e.g., a melody from user humming. The mediaguidance application may retrieve information about the user's locationfor a predetermined time period prior to detecting the portion of music.The media guidance application may then identify a source of mediaavailable at the user's location for the predetermined time period, anddetermine content accessible from the source of media, e.g., acommercial played at a display screen at a train station when the userwas waiting for the train. The media guidance application may comparethe portion of music to the content to identify a media asset having acharacteristic associated with the portion of music.

The media guidance application may capture, at a first time instance,from the environment where the user is present, an audio recording, andmay identify, from the audio recording, a tune having audiocharacteristics that match with vocal characteristics of the user. Forexample, the media guidance application may extract a set of monosignals from the audio recording. For each mono signal from the set ofmono signals, the media guidance application may generate a set of audiocharacteristics corresponding to the mono signal. The media guidanceapplication may then retrieve, from the profile of the user, a set ofvocal characteristics corresponding to the user. The media guidanceapplication may compare each characteristic of the set of audiocharacteristics with a corresponding characteristic from the set ofvocal characteristics of the same type.

In response to identifying the tune, the media guidance application maygenerate a frequency domain representation of the tune including aplurality of tones. For example, the mono audio signal may betransformed, via Fourier transform, to a frequency domainrepresentation.

The media guidance application may transmit a query based on thegenerated frequency domain representation to a music database. Forexample, the media guidance application may generate an audio signaturebased on the frequency domain representation of the tune, and send theaudio signature to the music database storing audio signatures ofdifferent media assets. In response to the query, the media guidanceapplication may receive a result indicating an identified media asset.Or the media guidance application may receive an indication of a failureto find a match in the music database based on the generated frequencydomain representation.

In response to receiving no result by database search, the mediaguidance application may retrieve, from a profile of the user, alocation history of the user and an application usage historycorresponding to the user within a pre-defined duration of time prior tothe first time instance. In some embodiments, the media guidanceapplication may transmit a query to a device of the user for a GPS logand an application usage log within the pre-defined duration of timeprior to the first time instance.

In some embodiments, when the location history is not available from thedevice of the user, the media guidance application may transmit, to aserver, a query for a record of social media activities relating to theuser within the pre-defined duration prior to the first time instance.In response to the query for the record of social media activities, themedia guidance application may search the record of social mediaactivities relating to the user for a first subset of social mediaactivities, in which each social media activity from the subsetidentifying a location. For example, the media guidance application mayretrieve social media posts relating to the user within the past 12hours, and identify social media posts showing the user “check-in” at alocation. The media guidance application may then store the first subsetof social media activities and corresponding locations as part of thelocation history.

In some embodiments, in response to receiving a notification that theapplication usage history is unavailable from the device of the user,the media guidance application may search the record of social mediaactivities relating to the user for a second subset of social mediaactivities. Each social media activity from the second subset indicatesthat the user is using a respective application. For example, when theuser was playing a video game via a gaming application on the userdevice, the gaming application may generate and post a social mediastatus as “Jane Doe is playing Super Candy” on social media. The mediaguidance application may then store the second subset of social mediaactivities and information relating to respective applications as partof the application usage history.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may identify, from alocation history, a plurality of locations that the user has beenpresent at during the pre-defined duration of time. The media guidanceapplication may then determine a first subset of the plurality oflocations for locations that the user was present at for more than athreshold amount of time. For each location from the first subset, themedia guidance application may query a location database for informationrelating to media availability at the location. For example, the mediaguidance application may retrieve information from the location databasethat the location of “science club” has access to a number of broadcasttelevision channels.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine a typeof the respective location. In response to determining that therespective location is of a type that is likely to provide mediatransmission to the user, e.g., an indoor venue, the media guidanceapplication may identify the respective location as a candidate for thefirst location. In response to determining that the respective locationis of a type that is unlikely to provide media transmission to the user,e.g., an outdoor venue, the media guidance application may search theapplication usage history for an application usage record correspondingto a respective time period when the user was present at the respectivelocation, and determine whether the application usage record relates tomedia content delivery. For example, the media guidance application maydetermine whether the user has used an application running on the deviceof the user to access media content, e.g., listening to digital radioprograms while on a hiking trail.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine whatmedia source is available at a location where the user was present basedon past activity pattern of the user. Specifically, the media guidanceapplication may transmit, to a server, a query for a record of socialmedia activities relating to the user within a past period of time. Inresponse to obtaining the record of social media activities relating tothe user, the media guidance application may search the record of socialmedia activities for a subset of social media activities that occurredat the first location. The media guidance application may then search apast transmission schedule across a plurality of media sources at arespective time corresponding to the respective social media activitybased on the one or more keywords. For example, the media guidanceapplication may determine that the user has a pattern of watching amedia asset at the location. Thus, in response to identifying a mediaasset from a media source from the past transmission schedule matchesthe one or more keywords, the media guidance application may determinethat the media source, e.g., the television channel on which the mediaasset is aired, is available at the first location.

Upon determining the source of the media asset available at the firstlocation during the first period of time, the media guidance applicationmay determine whether the user was paying attention to the media assetdisplayed at the location when the user was present at the location.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may utilize theapplication usage history to determine whether the user was distracted,e.g., playing video games on the user device, attending a phone call,etc. Specifically, the media guidance application may retrieve contentof a first media asset transmitted from the source of media asset duringthe first period of time, and determine whether the user was exposed tothe retrieved content of the media asset based at least in part on userapplication usage history from a user device. The media guidanceapplication may search the application usage history for one or moreapplication usage records corresponding to the first period of time whenthe user was present at the first location. The media guidanceapplication may determine an application type, an application usagestatus and an application usage time duration for each of the one ormore application usage records. The media guidance application may thensearch, an application usage table, for a distraction scorecorresponding to each application type. For example, the distractionscore is a numeric value indicative of a degree that the user isdistracted from other activities.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may compute adistraction metric based on the distraction score corresponding to eachapplication type, the respective application usage status and therespective application usage time duration. For example, the distractionmetric is computed as a weighted sum of the respective distractionscores of all applications that have been accessed during the time whenthe user was present at the location and each distraction score isweighted by a percentage of time duration that the application is in useas compared to the entire duration when the user was present at thelocation. In response to determining that the user was exposed to theretrieved content of the first media asset, the media guidanceapplication may proceed to determine whether the media asset the userhas been exposed to contains the user humming.

Specifically, the media guidance application may determine a firstplurality of music tunes transmitted with the content of the first mediaasset. For example, the media guidance application may generate an audiosignature of the theme song indicated in the metadata. In response todetermining that the metadata includes no information relating to anytheme song, the media guidance application may perform audio analysis ofthe first media asset to generate the plurality of music tunes. Themedia guidance application may then identify whether the user hummingcorresponds to any of the music tunes from the media assets.

The media guidance application may then generate for display arecommendation of the first media asset featuring the respective musictune. In some embodiments, the media guidance application may includesocial influence from another user in searching for a media asset tomatch with the user humming. For example, the media guidance applicationmay determine whether a social connection of the user has beenco-located at a same location with the user during the pre-definedduration of time based on the location history of the user and a socialmedia activity at the same location. In response to determining that thesocial connection of the user has been co-located at the same locationwith the user, the media guidance application may obtain, from a server,a location history of the social connection and an application usagehistory of the social connection prior to a time when the socialconnection and the user were co-located at the same location. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine a second mediaasset that the social connection was exposed to based on the locationhistory of the social connection and the application usage history ofthe social connection, and then determine whether the user humming maycorrespond to any music tune featured in the second media asset.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other objects and advantages of the disclosure will beapparent upon consideration of the following detailed description, takenin conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like referencecharacters refer to like parts throughout, and in which:

FIG. 1 depicts an illustrative example diagram for identifying a mediaasset in response to an ambiguous search indicator such as user humming,in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 2 provides an example diagram illustrating an example of usersocial media activity record indicating a pattern of watching habitsassociated with a location that the user is present at, according toembodiments described herein;

FIG. 3 shows an example diagram illustrating an example screen ofrecommended media assets based on the identified media asset from FIG.1, accordingly to embodiments described herein;

FIG. 4 shows an illustrative embodiment of a display screen that may beused to provide media guidance application listings and other mediaguidance information, in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 5 shows another illustrative embodiment of a display screen thatmay be used to provide media guidance application listings, inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an illustrative user equipment (UE) devicein accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of an illustrative media system in accordancewith some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 8 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for identifying amedia asset based on an ambiguous search indicator provided by a user,in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 9 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for identifyingfrom a location history a location where the user is likely to beexposed to a media asset, in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 10 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for determining amedia source available at a location during the time when the user waspresent at the location, in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 11 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for determiningwhether the user was exposed to a media asset when the media asset wasdisplayed at a location where the user was present, in accordance withsome embodiments of the disclosure; and

FIG. 12 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for identifying amedia asset in response to a user humming based on social influence fromanother user, in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Systems and methods are disclosed herein for identifying a media assetbased on an ambiguous search indicator provided by a user. Specifically,a media guidance application, which is implemented at a set-top box ofuser equipment, may be used to engage an audio capturing device (e.g., amicrophone, etc.) to capture an audio recording from the environmentwhere the user is present. The media guidance application may detect aportion of music provided by a user from the audio recording, e.g., byuser humming a melody. The media guidance application may then identifywhich media asset the melody the user was humming belongs to, based onrecent activities of the user, and media assets the user has beenrecently exposed to.

For example, the media guidance application may capture the user humminga segment of music, which is a melody of “soft kitty” sung by acharacter of the television show “the Big Bang Theory.” The user mayonly remember a few syllabuses of the beginning of the song, and thehumming may be inaccurate. Also, the melody of “soft kitty” may not bestored at a music database as a stand-alone music item. Thus, by adirect audio search of comparing tones and audio signature of previouslystored music, the media guidance application may not be able to identifywhat music the user is humming or which media asset the melody belongsto. Instead, the media guidance application may determine what mediaassets the user may have been recently exposed to, to enhance the audiosearch. For instance, the media guidance application may retrieve aviewing history of the user, e.g., from a profile of the user. The mediaguidance application may retrieve a location history of the user, and bydetermining where the user has been present at, the media guidanceapplication may estimate what media asset the user may have been exposedto, based on a type of the location or activities that are likely to beheld at the location. For instance, if the user has been to a scienceclub on a university campus and has posted a social media status of“watching Big Bang Theory with buddies!”, the media guidance applicationmay correlate the user's exposure to the television show “the Big BangTheory.” Therefore, by comparing audio characteristics of the music tunehummed by the user with any background music feature in the televisionshow, the media guidance application may identify whether the music tuneis from the television show. The media guidance application may thenfind the episode where the melody is featured, and recommend the episodeto the user.

For another example, the media guidance application may identify andrecommend a media asset featuring a user preferred version of a musicitem to the user, by analyzing the media assets that the user have beenrecently exposed to. For instance, the user may hum a segment of a song“Someone like you.” When the tune hummed by the user is sufficientlyaccurate, conventional media system may, at most, identify the tunecorresponds to the song “Someone like you” by the artist “Adele.” Themedia guidance application may instead, identify that the user haswatched the television show American Idol featuring a contestant'sperformance with the background music of “Someone like you.” Thus, themedia guidance application may identify the episode of American Idolfeaturing the performance of “Someone like you,” and recommend theepisode to the user.

As referred to herein, the term “ambiguous” refers to an item that isunidentifiable with a clear interpretation. For example, an “ambiguous”search indicator may refer to a search indicator, e.g., in a textual,verbal, audio, video format, that leads to no search result at all, or alarge amount of search results from which the most relevant searchresult cannot be identified.

As referred to herein, the term “tune” refers to a melody thatcharacteristic a certain piece of music. As referred to herein, the term“tone” refers to a musical or vocal sound that is described bycharacteristics such as the pitch, the quality and the strength of thesound.

The amount of content available to users in any given content deliverysystem can be substantial. Consequently, many users desire a form ofmedia guidance through an interface that allows users to efficientlynavigate content selections and easily identify content that they maydesire. An application that provides such guidance is referred to hereinas an interactive media guidance application or, sometimes, a mediaguidance application or a guidance application.

Interactive media guidance applications may take various forms dependingon the content for which they provide guidance. One typical type ofmedia guidance application is an interactive television program guide.Interactive television program guides (sometimes referred to aselectronic program guides) are well-known guidance applications that,among other things, allow users to navigate among and locate many typesof content or media assets. Interactive media guidance applications maygenerate graphical user interface screens that enable a user to navigateamong, locate and select content. As referred to herein, the terms“media asset” and “content” should be understood to mean anelectronically consumable user asset, such as television programming, aswell as pay-per-view programs, on-demand programs (as in VOD systems),Internet content (e.g., streaming content, downloadable content,Webcasts, etc.), video clips, audio, content information, pictures,rotating images, documents, playlists, websites, articles, books,electronic books, blogs, chat sessions, social media, applications,games, and/or any other media or multimedia and/or combination of thesame. Guidance applications also allow users to navigate among andlocate content. As referred to herein, the term “multimedia” should beunderstood to mean content that utilizes at least two different contentforms described above, for example, text, audio, images, video, orinteractivity content forms. Content may be recorded, played, displayedor accessed by user equipment devices, but can also be part of a liveperformance.

The media guidance application and/or any instructions for performingany of the embodiments discussed herein may be encoded oncomputer-readable media. Computer-readable media includes any mediacapable of storing data. The computer readable media may be transitory,including, but not limited to, propagating electrical or electromagneticsignals, or may be non-transitory including, but not limited to,volatile and non-volatile computer memory or storage devices such as ahard disk, floppy disk, USB drive, DVD, CD, media cards, registermemory, processor caches, Random Access Memory (“RAM”), etc.

It is to be noted that embodiments described herein may be implementedby a media guidance application implemented on a set-top box, or anyother application that receives media guidance data and that can beconfigured to remotely communicate with a set-top box.

With the advent of the Internet, mobile computing, and high-speedwireless networks, users are accessing media on user equipment deviceson which they traditionally did not use. As referred to herein, thephrase “user equipment device,” “user equipment,” “user device,”“electronic device,” “electronic equipment,” “media equipment device,”or “media device” should be understood to mean any device for accessingthe content described above, such as a television, a Smart TV, a set-topbox, an integrated receiver decoder (IRD) for handling satellitetelevision, a digital storage device, a digital media receiver (DMR), adigital media adapter (DMA), a streaming media device, a DVD player, aDVD recorder, a connected DVD, a local media server, a BLU-RAY player, aBLU-RAY recorder, a personal computer (PC), a laptop computer, a tabletcomputer, a WebTV box, a personal computer television (PC/TV), a PCmedia server, a PC media center, a hand-held computer, a stationarytelephone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a mobile telephone, aportable video player, a portable music player, a portable gamingmachine, a smart phone, or any other television equipment, computingequipment, or wireless device, and/or combination of the same. In someembodiments, the user equipment device may have a front facing screenand a rear facing screen, multiple front screens, or multiple angledscreens. In some embodiments, the user equipment device may have a frontfacing camera and/or a rear facing camera. On these user equipmentdevices, users may be able to navigate among and locate the same contentavailable through a television. Consequently, media guidance may beavailable on these devices, as well. The guidance provided may be forcontent available only through a television, for content available onlythrough one or more of other types of user equipment devices, or forcontent available both through a television and one or more of the othertypes of user equipment devices. The media guidance applications may beprovided as online applications (i.e., provided on a web-site), or asstand-alone applications or clients on user equipment devices. Variousdevices and platforms that may implement media guidance applications aredescribed in more detail below.

One of the functions of the media guidance application is to providemedia guidance data to users. As referred to herein, the phrase “mediaguidance data” or “guidance data” should be understood to mean any datarelated to content or data used in operating the guidance application.For example, the guidance data may include program information, guidanceapplication settings, user preferences, user profile information, medialistings, media-related information (e.g., broadcast times, broadcastchannels, titles, descriptions, ratings information (e.g., parentalcontrol ratings, critic's ratings, etc.), genre or category information,actor information, logo data for broadcasters” or providers” logos,etc.), media format (e.g., standard definition, high definition, 3D,etc.), on-demand information, blogs, websites, and any other type ofguidance data that is helpful for a user to navigate among and locatedesired content selections.

As referred to herein, the term “in response to” refers to initiated asa result of. For example, a first action being performed in response toa second action may include interstitial steps between the first actionand the second action. As referred to herein, the term “directly inresponse to” refers to caused by. For example, a first action beingperformed directly in response to a second action may not includeinterstitial steps between the first action and the second action.

FIG. 1 depicts an illustrative example diagram 100 for identifying amedia asset based on an ambiguous search indicator provided by a user bycorrelating media assets that the user has been recently exposed to, inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. Diagram 100 showsuser equipment 106 that may include a step-top box, on which the mediaguidance application is implemented. The screen of user equipment 106may display an interactive media guidance application, which mayprovide, e.g., recommendations of media assets 108 a-b to the user.

Diagram 100 further shows a user 102 in proximity to the user equipment106, and the user 102 may be optionally operating a user device 114.Specifically, the media guidance application may capture, at a firsttime instance, from the environment where the user 102 is present, anaudio recording. For example, the media guidance application mayperiodically, intermittently or constantly record ambient backgroundnoise of the room where the user is present. In some implementations, anaudio capturing device, which may be implemented with user equipment106, may be used to capture the audio recording. In anotherimplementation, a client component of the media guidance applicationrunning on the user device 114 may be used to capture the audiorecording.

The media guidance application may identify, from the audio recording, atune having audio characteristics that match with vocal characteristicsof the user. For example, the media guidance application may extract aset of mono signals from the audio recording, e.g., by converting aplurality of audio signals from the audio recordings to the frequencydomain via Fourier transform, and identifying mono signals among thefrequency domain representation. For each mono signal from the set ofmono signals, the media guidance application may generate a set of audiocharacteristics corresponding to the mono signal. For example, the setof audio characteristics includes any of mel-frequency cepstralcoefficients (MFCC), perceptual linear prediction relative spectra(PLP-RASTA). For another example, the set of audio characteristics mayinclude the spectrum range, strength, and/or the like. The mediaguidance application may then retrieve, from the profile of the user(e.g., from storage 608 in FIG. 6), a set of vocal characteristics,which may include the pitch, loudness, MFCC, PLP-RASTA, and/or the like.The media guidance application may compare each characteristic of theset of audio characteristics with a corresponding characteristic fromthe set of vocal characteristics of the same type.

For example, the media guidance application determines whether the MFCCof the mono signal and the stored MFCC of the user's voice are within asmall range of difference (e.g., 3%, 5%, etc.). If the characteristicsof the same kind are within the small rage of difference, the twocharacteristics are considered to be a match. The media guidanceapplication may then determine whether the set of audio characteristicsand the set of vocal characteristics overlap, e.g., match, for more thana similarity threshold (e.g., 65%, 68%, etc.). In response todetermining that the set of audio characteristics and the set of vocalcharacteristics overlap for more than the similarity threshold, themedia guidance application may identify the mono signal as a vocalsignal from the user. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, the mediaguidance application may capture an audio including a melody 113 hummerby the user, and may then generate a mono audio signal representing theuser humming 113.

In response to identifying the tune, the media guidance application maygenerate a frequency domain representation of the tune including aplurality of tones. For example, the mono audio signal of user humming113, which may be represented as a time-domain signal, may betransformed, via Fourier transform, to a frequency domainrepresentation. The Fourier frequency domain representation may take aform as a summation of a plurality of frequency components, eachfrequency component corresponding to a respective tone of the audiosignal.

The media guidance application may transmit a query based on thegenerated frequency domain representation to a music database. Forexample, the media guidance application may generate an audio signaturebased on the frequency domain representation of the user humming 113,and send the audio signature to the music database (e.g., data source716 in FIG. 7) storing audio signatures of different media assets. Inresponse to the query, the media guidance application may receive aresult indicating an identified media asset, e.g., the name of a song, amusic album, an artist, etc. Or the media guidance application mayreceive an indication of a failure to find a match in the music databasebased on the generated frequency domain representation. For example,when the user humming 113 is inaccurate or off-key, the media guidanceapplication may not be able to identify the tune based on audiosignature match. For another example, when the user humming 113corresponds to a melody of “soft kitty” featured in the television show“the Big Bang Theory,” and the melody itself is not published or storedas a song in the music database, the media guidance application may notbe able to identify it.

In response to receiving no result by database search, the mediaguidance application may determine media assets that the user have hasbeen recently exposed to. Specifically, the media guidance applicationmay retrieve, from a profile of the user, a location history of the userand an application usage history corresponding to the user within apre-defined duration of time prior to the first time instance, e.g., theprevious 12 hours, 24 hours, and/or the like before the time when theuser humming 113 is captured.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may transmit arequest to the user device 114 for the location history and/or theapplication usage history. Specifically, the media guidance applicationmay transmit a query to a device of the user for a GPS log and anapplication usage log within the pre-defined duration of time prior tothe first time instance. For example, the user device 114 may keep a GPSlog that tracks the location of the user device. Similarly, the userdevice 114 may keep an application usage log that track the applicationusage on the user device. In some embodiments, the media guidanceapplication may retrieve, from a user profile, information relating tomore than one user devices that correspond to the user 102, and may thencollect GPS logs and/or application usage history from the various userdevices.

In some embodiments, the GPS log may not be available from a user device114. For example, the user device 114 may not be configured to share theGPS log information with the media guidance application. In this case,the media guidance application may gather other indications of useractivities to collect information relating to the location history,e.g., user calendar information, user social media activities (such as“check-in” at a location), user social communications, and/or the like.Specifically, the media guidance application may transmit, to a server,a query for a record of social media activities relating to the userwithin the pre-defined duration prior to the first time instance, e.g.,12 hours, 24 hours before the user humming 113 was captured. In responseto the query for the record of social media activities, the mediaguidance application may search the record of social media activitiesrelating to the user for a first subset of social media activities, inwhich each social media activity from the subset identifying a location.For example, the media guidance application may retrieve social mediaposts relating to the user within the past 12 hours, and identify socialmedia posts showing the user “check-in” at a location, e.g., a“check-in” post at the “science club” 116. The media guidanceapplication may then store the first subset of social media activitiesand corresponding locations as part of the location history. For anotherexample, the media guidance application may determine a location theuser has traveled to, e.g., “TV night at the science club,” from acalendar of the user, from a group chat message, from a reservationemail, and/or the like.

In some embodiments, when the application usage history is not availableor sharable from the user device 114, the media guidance application maygather application usage information through third party social mediaposts. Specifically, in response to receiving a notification that theapplication usage history is unavailable from the device of the user,the media guidance application may search the record of social mediaactivities relating to the user for a second subset of social mediaactivities. Each social media activity from the second subset indicatesthat the user is using a respective application. For example, when theuser 102 was playing a video game via a gaming application on the userdevice 114, the gaming application may generate and post a social mediastatus as “Jane Doe is playing Super Candy” on social media. Anotherexample includes a user sharing a rating of a media asset that he or shejust watched on social media, e.g., “Jane Doe just rated the Big BangTheory on YouTube.” The media guidance application may then store thesecond subset of social media activities and information relating torespective applications as part of the application usage history.

The media guidance application may then identify from the locationhistory, a first location where the user was present during a firstperiod of time within the pre-defined duration of time. For example, themedia guidance application may identify, through the past social mediastatus 116 posted by the user, that the user was at the location of“science club” at a certain time.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determinewhether a given location where the user was present provides anyexposure to media assets. Specifically, the media guidance applicationmay identify, from a location history, a plurality of locations that theuser has been present at during the pre-defined duration of time. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine that the user hasbeen present at the “science club,” “Delancey street station,” “ABCpharmacy,” and/or the like, during the past 12 hours. The media guidanceapplication may then determine a first subset of the plurality oflocations for locations that the user was present at for more than athreshold amount of time, e.g., 10 minutes, 20 minutes, and/or the like.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may for eachlocation from the first subset, query a location database forinformation relating to media availability at the location. For example,the media guidance application may retrieve information from thelocation database that the location of “science club” has access to anumber of broadcast television channels. For another example, the mediaguidance application may retrieve information from the location databasethat the location of “Delancey street station” features a display screenfor video advertisements and a schedule of the advertisements.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine thatthe user 102 may be exposed to media assets based on a type of thelocation, even if the location itself does not provide any mediastreaming, e.g., a user may usually listen to digital radio via his orher personal device when he or she is located at the gym. Specifically,the media guidance application may determine a type of the respectivelocation. In response to determining that the respective location is ofa type that is likely to provide media transmission to the user, e.g.,an indoor venue such as a club, a restaurant, a sports bar, etc., themedia guidance application may identify the respective location as acandidate for the first location.

In some embodiments, in response to determining that the respectivelocation is of a type that is unlikely to provide media transmission tothe user, e.g., an outdoor venue such as a national park, a hikingtrail, etc., the media guidance application may determine whether theuser may access a media asset via a user device. Specifically, the mediaguidance application may search the application usage history for anapplication usage record corresponding to a respective time period whenthe user was present at the respective location, and determine whetherthe application usage record relates to media content delivery. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine that the locationhistory shows the user was present at “Central Park” between 2 PM and 4PM, and during this time, the application usage history shows that aPandora application running on the user device 114 was active during 3PM to 4 PM. The media guidance application may determine that the userwas exposed to media assets streamed from the Pandora application whenthe user was present at “Central Park.” Specifically, in response todetermining that the application usage record relates to media contentdelivery, the media guidance application may associate a media assetthat is indicated by the application usage record with the respectivelocation.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine whatmedia source is available at a location where the user was present basedon past activity pattern of the user. For example, as shown in FIG. 2,the example social media posts of the user illustrate a pattern that theuser usually visits the location of “science club” and watch thetelevision show “the Big Bang Theory” when the show is aired, e.g., seesocial media posts 202-203 in the past two weeks. Then the mediaguidance application may determine that for the social media check-inmessage 201, even if the post does not specify the activity of the user,the user is located at “science club” and may be exposed to “the BigBang Theory.” Specifically, the media guidance application may transmit,to a server, a query for a record of social media activities relating tothe user within a past period of time. In response to obtaining therecord of social media activities relating to the user, the mediaguidance application may search the record of social media activitiesfor a subset of social media activities that occurred at the firstlocation. For example, the media guidance application may select socialmedia posts 202-203 that both occurred at the location of “scienceclub.” For each social media activity from the subset, the mediaguidance application may extract one or more keywords from therespective social media activity. For example, the media guidanceapplication may extract “watching,” “Big Bang Theory” from post 202; andextract “night,” “folks,” “Sheldon Cooper,” from post 203. The mediaguidance application may then search a past transmission schedule acrossa plurality of media sources at a respective time corresponding to therespective social media activity based on the one or more keywords. Forexample, the media guidance application may search a program listing,e.g., retrieved from data source 716 or 718 in FIG. 7, based on keywords“Big Bang Theory” or “Sheldon Cooper.” In response to the search orquery, the media guidance application may identify the media asset “theBig Bang Theory” and the corresponding air time, and the media guidanceapplication may verify that the air time coincides with the time thatthe user was present at the location “science club,” as reflected in theposting time of the social media post 201. Thus, in response toidentifying a media asset from a media source from the past transmissionschedule matches the one or more keywords, the media guidanceapplication may determine that the media source, e.g., the televisionchannel on which “Big Bang Theory” is aired, is available at the firstlocation.

Upon determining the source of the media asset available at the firstlocation during the first period of time, the media guidance applicationmay determine whether the user was paying attention to the media assetdisplayed at the location when the user was present at the location. Forexample, even if the user was present at “science club” for “televisionnight” to watch the “Big Bang Theory,” the user might be distracted,e.g., playing video games on his or her user device 114, working on aword document on a personal computer, talking on a phone, etc. Differenttypes of user activities may affect the chance that the user was exposedto the media asset. For example, if the user was actively working on aword document at the “science club,” where the media asset was beingplayed, the user is likely to be at least partially exposed to the mediaasset. For another example, if the user was streaming a live footballgame on his or her user device when the user was present at the “scienceclub” where “the Big Bang Theory” was played, the user is much lesslikely to be exposed to the “Big Bang Theory.”

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may utilize theapplication usage history to determine whether the user was distracted.Specifically, the media guidance application may retrieve content of afirst media asset transmitted from the source of media asset during thefirst period of time, and determine whether the user was exposed to theretrieved content of the media asset based at least in part on userapplication usage history from a user device. The media guidanceapplication may search the application usage history for one or moreapplication usage records corresponding to the first period of time whenthe user was present at the first location. For example, the mediaguidance application may retrieve a list of applications that have beenaccessed or used during the time frame when the media asset “the BigBang Theory” was being aired, and when the user was present at the“science club.” The list of applications may include the name of eachapplication that has been accessed and a duration of time when theapplication has been accessed.

In some embodiments, in response to identifying the one or moreapplication usage records, the media guidance application may determinean application type, an application usage status and an applicationusage time duration for each of the one or more application usagerecords. For example, the application usage record may indicate a gamingapplication was active from 19:48 to 20:26, and an email application wasaccessed from 20:15 to 20:19, and/or the like. The media guidanceapplication may then search, an application usage table, for adistraction score corresponding to each application type. For example,the distraction score is a numeric value indicative of a degree that theuser is distracted from other activities, i.e., the higher thedistraction score, the more occupied the user is with the respectiveapplication and less likely to pay attention to media assets playing inthe background. An example distraction table may take a form similar tothe following:

TABLE 1 Example Distraction Scores Application Type Distraction ScoreGaming Application 0.85 Media player 0.90 Social media 0.66 Email 0.55 .. . . . .

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may compute adistraction metric based on the distraction score corresponding to eachapplication type, the respective application usage status and therespective application usage time duration. For example, the distractionmetric is computed as a weighted sum of the respective distractionscores of all applications that have been accessed during the time whenthe user was present at the location “science club.” Each distractionscore is weighted by a percentage of time duration that the applicationis in use as compared to the entire duration when the user was presentat the location. For example, if the application usage record shows agaming application was accessed from 19:48 to 20:26, and an emailapplication was accessed from 20:15 to 20:19, and the location historyshows the user was present at “science club” from 19:30 to 20:30, thedistraction metric is calculated as: 0.85×38/60+0.55×4/60=0.57.

In some embodiments, in response to determining that the distractionmetric is higher than a distraction threshold (e.g., 0.5, etc.), themedia guidance application may determine that the user was not exposedto the retrieved content of the media asset. In response to determiningthat the user was exposed to the retrieved content of the first mediaasset, the media guidance application may proceed to determine whetherthe media asset the user has been exposed to contains the user humming113. Specifically, the media guidance application may determine a firstplurality of music tunes transmitted with the content of the first mediaasset.

For example, in some embodiments, the media guidance application mayretrieve metadata associated with the first media asset to determinewhether the metadata includes information relating to a theme song, orinformation relating to the background music. If the metadata identifiesa title of a song that is featured in the media asset, the mediaguidance application may transmit a query to a music database based onthe title of the theme song. In response to the query, the mediaguidance application may obtain an audio asset of the theme song andgenerating a tune for the audio asset. For example, the media guidanceapplication may generate an audio signature of the theme song. Inresponse to determining that the metadata includes no informationrelating to any theme song, the media guidance application may performaudio analysis of the first media asset to generate the plurality ofmusic tunes. For example, the media guidance application may analyze thefrequency spectrum of the audio track of the media asset, and generateone or more audio signatures of audio signals representing instrumentalsounds.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may use applicationusage history to determine what content the user has been exposed to,e.g., music from video games, streaming media, etc. Specifically, inresponse to retrieving, from the profile of the user, the applicationusage history corresponding to the user within the pre-defined durationof time prior to the first time instance, for each application from theapplication usage history, the media guidance application may determinewhether the respective application delivers media content to the user bysearch an application inventory based on a respective applicationidentifier. For example, the media guidance application may query anapplication inventory based on the application identifier to determinewhether the application delivers content. In response to determiningthat the respective application delivers media content to the user, themedia guidance application may further determine a type of media contentthat the respective application delivers. For example, in response todetermining that the respective application provides live transmissionof media content (e.g., an Internet TV application, etc.), the mediaguidance application may identify a media asset that was transmitted viathe respective application during the pre-defined duration of time as acandidate for the first media asset. For another example, in response todetermining that the respective application provides an on-demand mediaasset (e.g., a media streaming application, etc.), the media guidanceapplication may identify the on-demand media asset that was transmittedto the user. For another example, in response to determining that therespective application provides a gaming application, the media guidanceapplication may query, a gaming database, for an audio signature oftunes used in the gaming application based on a name of the gamingapplication.

The media guidance application may compare the frequency domainrepresentation of the plurality of tones with each music tune of thefirst plurality of music tunes to generate a respective similaritymetric. For example, the media guidance application may generate anaudio signature for the tune representing the user humming 113, and anaudio signature for each of the music tune, and in turn compare theaudio signatures. In response to determining that the respectivesimilarity metric is greater than a similarity threshold (e.g., 76%,82%, etc.), the media guidance application may identify the respectivemusic tune from the first media asset corresponds to the audio recordingfrom the user.

The media guidance application may then generate for display arecommendation of the first media asset featuring the respective musictune. For example, the media guidance application may identify that theuser humming 113 corresponds to a melody of “soft kitty” sung by acharacter in a recently aired episode of “the Big Bang Theory” that theuser has been exposed to. The media guidance application may thenrecommend media assets 108 a-b, relating to the television episode, orthe melody featured in the episode to the user.

For another example, as shown in FIG. 3, if the media guidanceapplication identifies a tune that the user is humming corresponds tothe song “Someone like you,” the media guidance application may furtherdetermine, in a similar manner as described above, that the user hasbeen recently exposed to a performance in the “American Idol” showfeaturing “Someone like you.” The media guidance application mayprioritize media assets 302 a-b relating to the “American Idol” episodethat features the performance of “Someone like you” as recommendedcontent to the user. The media guidance application may also optionallyrecommend the original version of “Someone like you” 303 c to the user.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may include socialinfluence from another user in searching for a media asset to match withthe user humming 113. For example, if the user 102 has been interactingwith another user, who may have been humming the same melody duringtheir interaction, and influenced the user 102. In this case, the usermay have been influenced by the other, even if the application usagehistory or location history of the user does not show any exposure to acorresponding media asset.

Specifically, in response to determining that the respective similaritymetric is lower than a similarity threshold, the media guidanceapplication may determine whether a social connection of the user hasbeen co-located at a same location with the user during the pre-definedduration of time based on the location history of the user and a socialmedia activity at the same location. For example, if the user and thesocial contact has checked in at the same time at the same location,e.g., a restaurant, the media guidance application may determine thatthe user and the social contact has social interaction at the location.In response to determining that the social connection of the user hasbeen co-located at the same location with the user, the media guidanceapplication may expand the search to media assets that the user's socialconnection has been exposed to, which may have likely in turn influencedthe user. Specifically, the media guidance application may obtain, froma server, a location history of the social connection and an applicationusage history of the social connection prior to a time when the socialconnection and the user were co-located at the same location. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine a second mediaasset that the social connection was exposed to, based on the locationhistory of the social connection and the application usage history ofthe social connection. The media guidance application may determine asecond plurality of music tunes transmitted with the content of thesecond media asset, and compare the frequency domain representation ofthe plurality of tones with each music tune of the second plurality ofmusic tunes to determine whether the tune corresponds to the secondmedia asset.

FIGS. 4-5 show illustrative display screens that may be used to providemedia guidance data. The display screens shown in FIGS. 4-5 may beimplemented on any suitable user equipment device or platform, e.g.,user equipment 106 or the set-top box 120 in FIG. 1. While the displaysof FIGS. 4-5 are illustrated as full screen displays, they may also befully or partially overlaid over content being displayed. A user mayindicate a desire to access content information by selecting aselectable option provided in a display screen (e.g., a menu option, alistings option, an icon, a hyperlink, etc.) or pressing a dedicatedbutton (e.g., a GUIDE button) on a remote control or other user inputinterface or device. In response to the user's indication, the mediaguidance application may provide a display screen with media guidancedata organized in one of several ways, such as by time and channel in agrid, by time, by channel, by source, by content type, by category(e.g., movies, sports, news, children, or other categories ofprogramming), or other predefined, user-defined, or other organizationcriteria.

FIG. 4 shows illustrative grid of a program listings display 400arranged by time and channel that also enables access to different typesof content in a single display. Display 400 may include grid 402 with:(1) a column of channel/content type identifiers 404, where eachchannel/content type identifier (which is a cell in the column)identifies a different channel or content type available; and (2) a rowof time identifiers 406, where each time identifier (which is a cell inthe row) identifies a time block of programming. Grid 402 also includescells of program listings, such as program listing 408, where eachlisting provides the title of the program provided on the listing'sassociated channel and time. With a user input device, a user can selectprogram listings by moving highlight region 410. Information relating tothe program listing selected by highlight region 410 may be provided inprogram information region 412. Region 412 may include, for example, theprogram title, the program description, the time the program is provided(if applicable), the channel the program is on (if applicable), theprogram's rating, and other desired information.

In addition to providing access to linear programming (e.g., contentthat is scheduled to be transmitted to a plurality of user equipmentdevices at a predetermined time and is provided according to aschedule), the media guidance application also provides access tonon-linear programming (e.g., content accessible to a user equipmentdevice at any time and is not provided according to a schedule).Non-linear programming may include content from different contentsources including on-demand content (e.g., VOD), Internet content (e.g.,streaming media, downloadable media, etc.), locally stored content(e.g., content stored on any user equipment device described above orother storage device), or other time-independent content. On-demandcontent may include movies or any other content provided by a particularcontent provider (e.g., HBO On Demand providing “The Sopranos” and “CurbYour Enthusiasm”). HBO ON DEMAND is a service mark owned by Time WarnerCompany L.P. et al. and THE SOPRANOS and CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM aretrademarks owned by the Home Box Office, Inc. Internet content mayinclude web events, such as a chat session or Webcast, or contentavailable on-demand as streaming content or downloadable content throughan Internet web site or other Internet access (e.g. FTP).

Grid 402 may provide media guidance data for non-linear programmingincluding on-demand listing 414, recorded content listing 416, andInternet content listing 418. A display combining media guidance datafor content from different types of content sources is sometimesreferred to as a “mixed-media” display. Various permutations of thetypes of media guidance data that may be displayed that are differentthan display 400 may be based on user selection or guidance applicationdefinition (e.g., a display of only recorded and broadcast listings,only on-demand and broadcast listings, etc.). As illustrated, listings414, 416, and 418 are shown as spanning the entire time block displayedin grid 402 to indicate that selection of these listings may provideaccess to a display dedicated to on-demand listings, recorded listings,or Internet listings, respectively. In some embodiments, listings forthese content types may be included directly in grid 402. Additionalmedia guidance data may be displayed in response to the user selectingone of the navigational icons 420. (Pressing an arrow key on a userinput device may affect the display in a similar manner as selectingnavigational icons 420.)

Display 400 may also include video region 422, and options region 426.Video region 422 may allow the user to view and/or preview programs thatare currently available, will be available, or were available to theuser. The content of video region 422 may correspond to, or beindependent from, one of the listings displayed in grid 402. Griddisplays including a video region are sometimes referred to aspicture-in-guide (PIG) displays. PIG displays and their functionalitiesare described in greater detail in Satterfield et al. U.S. Pat. No.6,564,378, issued May 13, 4003 and Yuen et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,239,794,issued May 49, 4001, which are hereby incorporated by reference hereinin their entireties. PIG displays may be included in other mediaguidance application display screens of the embodiments describedherein.

Options region 426 may allow the user to access different types ofcontent, media guidance application displays, and/or media guidanceapplication features. Options region 426 may be part of display 400 (andother display screens described herein), or may be invoked by a user byselecting an on-screen option or pressing a dedicated or assignablebutton on a user input device. The selectable options within optionsregion 426 may concern features related to program listings in grid 402or may include options available from a main menu display. Featuresrelated to program listings may include searching for other air times orways of receiving a program, recording a program, enabling seriesrecording of a program, setting program and/or channel as a favorite,purchasing a program, or other features. Options available from a mainmenu display may include search options, VOD options, parental controloptions, Internet options, cloud-based options, device synchronizationoptions, second screen device options, options to access various typesof media guidance data displays, options to subscribe to a premiumservice, options to edit a user's profile, options to access a browseoverlay, or other options.

The media guidance application may be personalized based on a user'spreferences. A personalized media guidance application allows a user tocustomize displays and features to create a personalized “experience”with the media guidance application. This personalized experience may becreated by allowing a user to input these customizations and/or by themedia guidance application monitoring user activity to determine varioususer preferences. Users may access their personalized guidanceapplication by logging in or otherwise identifying themselves to theguidance application. Customization of the media guidance applicationmay be made in accordance with a user profile. The customizations mayinclude varying presentation schemes (e.g., color scheme of displays,font size of text, etc.), aspects of content listings displayed (e.g.,only HDTV or only 4D programming, user-specified broadcast channelsbased on favorite channel selections, re-ordering the display ofchannels, recommended content, etc.), desired recording features (e.g.,recording or series recordings for particular users, recording quality,etc.), parental control settings, customized presentation of Internetcontent (e.g., presentation of social media content, e-mail,electronically delivered articles, etc.) and other desiredcustomizations.

The media guidance application may allow a user to provide user profileinformation or may automatically compile user profile information. Themedia guidance application may, for example, monitor the content theuser accesses and/or other interactions the user may have with theguidance application. Additionally, the media guidance application mayobtain all or part of other user profiles that are related to aparticular user (e.g., from other web sites on the Internet the useraccesses, such as www.Tivo.com, from other media guidance applicationsthe user accesses, from other interactive applications the useraccesses, from another user equipment device of the user, etc.), and/orobtain information about the user from other sources that the mediaguidance application may access. As a result, a user can be providedwith a unified guidance application experience across the user'sdifferent user equipment devices. This type of user experience isdescribed in greater detail below in connection with FIG. 5. Additionalpersonalized media guidance application features are described ingreater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No.2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005, Boyer et al., U.S. Pat. No.7,165,098, issued Jan. 16, 2007, and Ellis et al., U.S. PatentApplication Publication No. 2002/0174430, filed Feb. 21, 2002, which arehereby incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.

Another display arrangement for providing media guidance is shown inFIG. 5. Video mosaic display 500 includes selectable options 502 forcontent information organized based on content type, genre, and/or otherorganization criteria. In display 500, television listings option 504 isselected, thus providing listings 506, 508, 510, and 512 as broadcastprogram listings. In display 500 the listings may provide graphicalimages including cover art, still images from the content, video clippreviews, live video from the content, or other types of content thatindicate to a user the content being described by the media guidancedata in the listing. Each of the graphical listings may also beaccompanied by text to provide further information about the contentassociated with the listing. For example, listing 508 may include morethan one portion, including media portion 514 and text portion 516.Media portion 514 and/or text portion 516 may be selectable to viewcontent in full-screen or to view information related to the contentdisplayed in media portion 514 (e.g., to view listings for the channelthat the video is displayed on).

The listings in display 500 are of different sizes (i.e., listing 506 islarger than listings 508, 510, and 512), but if desired, all thelistings may be the same size. Listings may be of different sizes orgraphically accentuated to indicate degrees of interest to the user orto emphasize certain content, as desired by the content provider orbased on user preferences. Various systems and methods for graphicallyaccentuating content listings are discussed in, for example, Yates, U.S.Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0153885, filed Nov. 12, 2009,which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

Users may access content and the media guidance application (and itsdisplay screens described above and below) from one or more of theiruser equipment devices. FIG. 6 shows a generalized embodiment ofillustrative user equipment device 600. More specific implementations ofuser equipment devices are discussed below in connection with FIG. 7.User equipment device 600 may receive content and data via input/output(hereinafter “I/O”) path 602. I/O path 602 may provide content (e.g.,broadcast programming, on-demand programming, Internet content, contentavailable over a local area network (LAN) or wide area network (WAN),and/or other content) and data to control circuitry 604, which includesprocessing circuitry 606 and storage 608. Control circuitry 604 may beused to send and receive commands, requests, and other suitable datausing I/O path 602. I/O path 602 may connect control circuitry 604 (andspecifically processing circuitry 606) to one or more communicationspaths (described below). I/O functions may be provided by one or more ofthese communications paths, but are shown as a single path in FIG. 6 toavoid overcomplicating the drawing.

Control circuitry 604 may be based on any suitable processing circuitrysuch as processing circuitry 606. As referred to herein, processingcircuitry should be understood to mean circuitry based on one or moremicroprocessors, microcontrollers, digital signal processors,programmable logic devices, field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs),application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), etc., and may includea multi-core processor (e.g., dual-core, quad-core, hexa-core, or anysuitable number of cores) or supercomputer. In some embodiments,processing circuitry may be distributed across multiple separateprocessors or processing units, for example, multiple of the same typeof processing units (e.g., two Intel Core i7 processors) or multipledifferent processors (e.g., an Intel Core i5 processor and an Intel Corei7 processor). In some embodiments, control circuitry 604 executesinstructions for a media guidance application stored in memory (i.e.,storage 608). Specifically, control circuitry 604 may be instructed bythe media guidance application to perform the functions discussed aboveand below. For example, the media guidance application may provideinstructions to control circuitry 604 to generate the media guidancedisplays. In some implementations, any action performed by controlcircuitry 604 may be based on instructions received from the mediaguidance application.

In client-server based embodiments, control circuitry 604 may includecommunications circuitry suitable for communicating with a guidanceapplication server or other networks or servers. The instructions forcarrying out the above mentioned functionality may be stored on theguidance application server. Communications circuitry may include acable modem, an integrated services digital network (ISDN) modem, adigital subscriber line (DSL) modem, a telephone modem, Ethernet card,or a wireless modem for communications with other equipment, or anyother suitable communications circuitry. Such communications may involvethe Internet or any other suitable communications networks or paths(which is described in more detail in connection with FIG. 7). Inaddition, communications circuitry may include circuitry that enablespeer-to-peer communication of user equipment devices, or communicationof user equipment devices in locations remote from each other (describedin more detail below).

Memory may be an electronic storage device provided as storage 608 thatis part of control circuitry 604. As referred to herein, the phrase“electronic storage device” or “storage device” should be understood tomean any device for storing electronic data, computer software, orfirmware, such as random-access memory, read-only memory, hard drives,optical drives, digital video disc (DVD) recorders, compact disc (CD)recorders, BLU-RAY disc (BD) recorders, BLU-RAY 3D disc recorders,digital video recorders (DVR, sometimes called a personal videorecorder, or PVR), solid state devices, quantum storage devices, gamingconsoles, gaming media, or any other suitable fixed or removable storagedevices, and/or any combination of the same. Storage 608 may be used tostore various types of content described herein as well as mediaguidance data described above. Nonvolatile memory may also be used(e.g., to launch a boot-up routine and other instructions). Cloud-basedstorage, described in relation to FIG. 7, may be used to supplementstorage 608 or instead of storage 608.

Control circuitry 604 may include video generating circuitry and tuningcircuitry, such as one or more analog tuners, one or more MPEG-2decoders or other digital decoding circuitry, high-definition tuners, orany other suitable tuning or video circuits or combinations of suchcircuits. Encoding circuitry (e.g., for converting over-the-air, analog,or digital signals to MPEG signals for storage) may also be provided.Control circuitry 604 may also include scaler circuitry for upconvertingand downconverting content into the preferred output format of the userequipment 600. Circuitry 404 may also include digital-to-analogconverter circuitry and analog-to-digital converter circuitry forconverting between digital and analog signals. The tuning and encodingcircuitry may be used by the user equipment device to receive and todisplay, to play, or to record content. The tuning and encodingcircuitry may also be used to receive guidance data. The circuitrydescribed herein, including for example, the tuning, video generating,encoding, decoding, encrypting, decrypting, scaler, and analog/digitalcircuitry, may be implemented using software running on one or moregeneral purpose or specialized processors. Multiple tuners may beprovided to handle simultaneous tuning functions (e.g., watch and recordfunctions, picture-in-picture (PIP) functions, multiple-tuner recording,etc.). If storage 608 is provided as a separate device from userequipment 600, the tuning and encoding circuitry (including multipletuners) may be associated with storage 608.

A user may send instructions to control circuitry 604 using user inputinterface 610. User input interface 610 may be any suitable userinterface, such as a remote control, mouse, trackball, keypad, keyboard,touch screen, touchpad, stylus input, joystick, voice recognitioninterface, or other user input interfaces. Display 612 may be providedas a stand-alone device or integrated with other elements of userequipment device 600. For example, display 612 may be a touchscreen ortouch-sensitive display. In such circumstances, user input interface 610may be integrated with or combined with display 612. Display 612 may beone or more of a monitor, a television, a liquid crystal display (LCD)for a mobile device, amorphous silicon display, low temperature polysilicon display, electronic ink display, electrophoretic display, activematrix display, electro-wetting display, electrofluidic display, cathoderay tube display, light-emitting diode display, electroluminescentdisplay, plasma display panel, high-performance addressing display,thin-film transistor display, organic light-emitting diode display,surface-conduction electron-emitter display (SED), laser television,carbon nanotubes, quantum dot display, interferometric modulatordisplay, or any other suitable equipment for displaying visual images.In some embodiments, display 612 may be HDTV-capable. In someembodiments, display 612 may be a 3D display, and the interactive mediaguidance application and any suitable content may be displayed in 3D. Avideo card or graphics card may generate the output to the display 612.The video card may offer various functions such as accelerated renderingof 3D scenes and 2D graphics, MPEG-2/MPEG-4 decoding, TV output, or theability to connect multiple monitors. The video card may be anyprocessing circuitry described above in relation to control circuitry604. The video card may be integrated with the control circuitry 604.Speakers 614 may be provided as integrated with other elements of userequipment device 600 or may be stand-alone units. The audio component ofvideos and other content displayed on display 612 may be played throughspeakers 614. In some embodiments, the audio may be distributed to areceiver (not shown), which processes and outputs the audio via speakers614.

The guidance application may be implemented using any suitablearchitecture. For example, it may be a stand-alone applicationwholly-implemented on user equipment device 600. In such an approach,instructions of the application are stored locally (e.g., in storage608), and data for use by the application is downloaded on a periodicbasis (e.g., from an out-of-band feed, from an Internet resource, orusing another suitable approach). Control circuitry 604 may retrieveinstructions of the application from storage 608 and process theinstructions to generate any of the displays discussed herein. Based onthe processed instructions, control circuitry 604 may determine whataction to perform when input is received from input interface 610. Forexample, movement of a cursor on a display up/down may be indicated bythe processed instructions when input interface 610 indicates that anup/down button was selected.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application is a client-serverbased application. Data for use by a thick or thin client implemented onuser equipment device 600 is retrieved on-demand by issuing requests toa server remote to the user equipment device 600. In one example of aclient-server based guidance application, control circuitry 604 runs aweb browser that interprets web pages provided by a remote server. Forexample, the remote server may store the instructions for theapplication in a storage device. The remote server may process thestored instructions using circuitry (e.g., control circuitry 604) andgenerate the displays discussed above and below. The client device mayreceive the displays generated by the remote server and may display thecontent of the displays locally on equipment device 600. This way, theprocessing of the instructions is performed remotely by the server whilethe resulting displays are provided locally on equipment device 600.Equipment device 600 may receive inputs from the user via inputinterface 610 and transmit those inputs to the remote server forprocessing and generating the corresponding displays. For example,equipment device 600 may transmit a communication to the remote serverindicating that an up/down button was selected via input interface 610.The remote server may process instructions in accordance with that inputand generate a display of the application corresponding to the input(e.g., a display that moves a cursor up/down). The generated display isthen transmitted to equipment device 600 for presentation to the user.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application is downloaded andinterpreted or otherwise run by an interpreter or virtual machine (runby control circuitry 604). In some embodiments, the guidance applicationmay be encoded in the ETV Binary Interchange Format (EBIF), received bycontrol circuitry 604 as part of a suitable feed, and interpreted by auser agent running on control circuitry 604. For example, the guidanceapplication may be an EBIF application. In some embodiments, theguidance application may be defined by a series of JAVA-based files thatare received and run by a local virtual machine or other suitablemiddleware executed by control circuitry 604. In some of suchembodiments (e.g., those employing MPEG-2 or other digital mediaencoding schemes), the guidance application may be, for example, encodedand transmitted in an MPEG-2 object carousel with the MPEG audio andvideo packets of a program.

User equipment device 600 of FIG. 6 can be implemented in system 600 ofFIG. 6 as user television equipment 602, user computer equipment 604,wireless user communications device 606, or any other type of userequipment suitable for accessing content, such as a non-portable gamingmachine. For simplicity, these devices may be referred to hereincollectively as user equipment or user equipment devices, and may besubstantially similar to user equipment devices described above. Userequipment devices, on which a media guidance application may beimplemented, may function as a standalone device or may be part of anetwork of devices. Various network configurations of devices may beimplemented and are discussed in more detail below.

A user equipment device utilizing at least some of the system featuresdescribed above in connection with FIG. 7 may not be classified solelyas user television equipment 702, user computer equipment 704, or awireless user communications device 706. For example, user televisionequipment 702 may, like some user computer equipment 704, beInternet-enabled allowing for access to Internet content, while usercomputer equipment 704 may, like some television equipment 702, includea tuner allowing for access to television programming. The mediaguidance application may have the same layout on various different typesof user equipment or may be tailored to the display capabilities of theuser equipment. For example, on user computer equipment 704, theguidance application may be provided as a web site accessed by a webbrowser. In another example, the guidance application may be scaled downfor wireless user communications devices 706.

In system 700, there is typically more than one of each type of userequipment device but only one of each is shown in FIG. 7 to avoidovercomplicating the drawing. In addition, each user may utilize morethan one type of user equipment device and also more than one of eachtype of user equipment device.

In some embodiments, a user equipment device (e.g., user televisionequipment 702, user computer equipment 704, wireless user communicationsdevice 706) may be referred to as a “second screen device.” For example,a second screen device may supplement content presented on a first userequipment device. The content presented on the second screen device maybe any suitable content that supplements the content presented on thefirst device. In some embodiments, the second screen device provides aninterface for adjusting settings and display preferences of the firstdevice. In some embodiments, the second screen device is configured forinteracting with other second screen devices or for interacting with asocial network. The second screen device can be located in the same roomas the first device, a different room from the first device but in thesame house or building, or in a different building from the firstdevice.

The user may also set various settings to maintain consistent mediaguidance application settings across in-home devices and remote devices.Settings include those described herein, as well as channel and programfavorites, programming preferences that the guidance applicationutilizes to make programming recommendations, display preferences, andother desirable guidance settings. For example, if a user sets a channelas a favorite on, for example, the web site www.Tivo.com on theirpersonal computer at their office, the same channel would appear as afavorite on the user's in-home devices (e.g., user television equipmentand user computer equipment) as well as the user's mobile devices, ifdesired. Therefore, changes made on one user equipment device can changethe guidance experience on another user equipment device, regardless ofwhether they are the same or a different type of user equipment device.In addition, the changes made may be based on settings input by a user,as well as user activity monitored by the guidance application.

The user equipment devices may be coupled to communications network 714.Namely, user television equipment 702, user computer equipment 704, andwireless user communications device 706 are coupled to communicationsnetwork 714 via communications paths 708, 710, and 712, respectively.Communications network 714 may be one or more networks including theInternet, a mobile phone network, mobile voice or data network (e.g., a4G or LTE network), cable network, public switched telephone network, orother types of communications network or combinations of communicationsnetworks. Paths 708, 710, and 712 may separately or together include oneor more communications paths, such as, a satellite path, a fiber-opticpath, a cable path, a path that supports Internet communications (e.g.,IPTV), free-space connections (e.g., for broadcast or other wirelesssignals), or any other suitable wired or wireless communications path orcombination of such paths. Path 712 is drawn with dotted lines toindicate that in the exemplary embodiment shown in FIG. 7 it is awireless path and paths 708 and 710 are drawn as solid lines to indicatethey are wired paths (although these paths may be wireless paths, ifdesired). Communications with the user equipment devices may be providedby one or more of these communications paths, but are shown as a singlepath in FIG. 7 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing.

Although communications paths are not drawn between user equipmentdevices, these devices may communicate directly with each other viacommunication paths, such as those described above in connection withpaths 708, 710, and 712, as well as other short-range point-to-pointcommunication paths, such as USB cables, IEEE 1394 cables, wirelesspaths (e.g., Bluetooth, infrared, IEEE 802-11x, etc.), or othershort-range communication via wired or wireless paths. BLUETOOTH is acertification mark owned by Bluetooth SIG, INC. The user equipmentdevices may also communicate with each other directly through anindirect path via communications network 714.

System 700 includes content source 716 and media guidance data source718 coupled to communications network 714 via communication paths 720and 722, respectively. Paths 720 and 722 may include any of thecommunication paths described above in connection with paths 708, 710,and 712. Communications with the content source 716 and media guidancedata source 718 may be exchanged over one or more communications paths,but are shown as a single path in FIG. 7 to avoid overcomplicating thedrawing. In addition, there may be more than one of each of contentsource 716 and media guidance data source 718, but only one of each isshown in FIG. 7 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing. (The differenttypes of each of these sources are discussed below.) If desired, contentsource 716 and media guidance data source 718 may be integrated as onesource device. Although communications between sources 716 and 718 withuser equipment devices 702, 704, and 706 are shown as throughcommunications network 714, in some embodiments, sources 716 and 718 maycommunicate directly with user equipment devices 702, 704, and 706 viacommunication paths (not shown) such as those described above inconnection with paths 708, 710, and 712.

Content source 716 may include one or more types of content distributionequipment including a television distribution facility, cable systemheadend, satellite distribution facility, programming sources (e.g.,television broadcasters, such as NBC, ABC, HBO, etc.), intermediatedistribution facilities and/or servers, Internet providers, on-demandmedia servers, and other content providers. NBC is a trademark owned bythe National Broadcasting Company, Inc., ABC is a trademark owned by theAmerican Broadcasting Company, Inc., and HBO is a trademark owned by theHome Box Office, Inc. Content source 716 may be the originator ofcontent (e.g., a television broadcaster, a Webcast provider, etc.) ormay not be the originator of content (e.g., an on-demand contentprovider, an Internet provider of content of broadcast programs fordownloading, etc.). Content source 716 may include cable sources,satellite providers, on-demand providers, Internet providers,over-the-top content providers, or other providers of content. Contentsource 716 may also include a remote media server used to storedifferent types of content (including video content selected by a user),in a location remote from any of the user equipment devices. Systems andmethods for remote storage of content, and providing remotely storedcontent to user equipment are discussed in greater detail in connectionwith Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 7,761,892, issued Jul. 20, 2010, whichis hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

Media guidance data source 718 may provide media guidance data, such asthe media guidance data described above. Media guidance data may beprovided to the user equipment devices using any suitable approach. Insome embodiments, the guidance application may be a stand-aloneinteractive television program guide that receives program guide datavia a data feed (e.g., a continuous feed or trickle feed). Programschedule data and other guidance data may be provided to the userequipment on a television channel sideband, using an in-band digitalsignal, using an out-of-band digital signal, or by any other suitabledata transmission technique. Program schedule data and other mediaguidance data may be provided to user equipment on multiple analog ordigital television channels.

In some embodiments, guidance data from media guidance data source 718may be provided to users” equipment using a client-server approach. Forexample, a user equipment device may pull media guidance data from aserver, or a server may push media guidance data to a user equipmentdevice. In some embodiments, a guidance application client residing onthe user's equipment may initiate sessions with source 718 to obtainguidance data when needed, e.g., when the guidance data is out of dateor when the user equipment device receives a request from the user toreceive data. Media guidance may be provided to the user equipment withany suitable frequency (e.g., continuously, daily, a user-specifiedperiod of time, a system-specified period of time, in response to arequest from user equipment, etc.). Media guidance data source 718 mayprovide user equipment devices 702, 704, and 706 the media guidanceapplication itself or software updates for the media guidanceapplication.

In some embodiments, the media guidance data may include viewer data.For example, the viewer data may include current and/or historical useractivity information (e.g., what content the user typically watches,what times of day the user watches content, whether the user interactswith a social network, at what times the user interacts with a socialnetwork to post information, what types of content the user typicallywatches (e.g., pay TV or free TV), mood, brain activity information,etc.). The media guidance data may also include subscription data. Forexample, the subscription data may identify to which sources or servicesa given user subscribes and/or to which sources or services the givenuser has previously subscribed but later terminated access (e.g.,whether the user subscribes to premium channels, whether the user hasadded a premium level of services, whether the user has increasedInternet speed). In some embodiments, the viewer data and/or thesubscription data may identify patterns of a given user for a period ofmore than one year. The media guidance data may include a model (e.g., asurvivor model) used for generating a score that indicates a likelihooda given user will terminate access to a service/source. For example, themedia guidance application may process the viewer data with thesubscription data using the model to generate a value or score thatindicates a likelihood of whether the given user will terminate accessto a particular service or source. In particular, a higher score mayindicate a higher level of confidence that the user will terminateaccess to a particular service or source. Based on the score, the mediaguidance application may generate promotions that entice the user tokeep the particular service or source indicated by the score as one towhich the user will likely terminate access.

Media guidance applications may be, for example, stand-aloneapplications implemented on user equipment devices. For example, themedia guidance application may be implemented as software or a set ofexecutable instructions which may be stored in storage 408, and executedby control circuitry 604 of a user equipment device 400. In someembodiments, media guidance applications may be client-serverapplications where only a client application resides on the userequipment device, and server application resides on a remote server. Forexample, media guidance applications may be implemented partially as aclient application on control circuitry 604 of user equipment device 600and partially on a remote server as a server application (e.g., mediaguidance data source 718) running on control circuitry of the remoteserver. When executed by control circuitry of the remote server (such asmedia guidance data source 718), the media guidance application mayinstruct the control circuitry to generate the guidance applicationdisplays and transmit the generated displays to the user equipmentdevices. The server application may instruct the control circuitry ofthe media guidance data source 718 to transmit data for storage on theuser equipment. The client application may instruct control circuitry ofthe receiving user equipment to generate the guidance applicationdisplays.

Content and/or media guidance data delivered to user equipment devices702, 704, and 706 may be over-the-top (OTT) content. OTT contentdelivery allows Internet-enabled user devices, including any userequipment device described above, to receive content that is transferredover the Internet, including any content described above, in addition tocontent received over cable or satellite connections. OTT content isdelivered via an Internet connection provided by an Internet serviceprovider (ISP), but a third party distributes the content. The ISP maynot be responsible for the viewing abilities, copyrights, orredistribution of the content, and may only transfer IP packets providedby the OTT content provider. Examples of OTT content providers includeYOUTUBE, NETFLIX, and HULU, which provide audio and video via IPpackets. Youtube is a trademark owned by Google Inc., Netflix is atrademark owned by Netflix Inc., and Hulu is a trademark owned by Hulu,LLC. OTT content providers may additionally or alternatively providemedia guidance data described above. In addition to content and/or mediaguidance data, providers of OTT content can distribute media guidanceapplications (e.g., web-based applications or cloud-based applications),or the content can be displayed by media guidance applications stored onthe user equipment device.

Media guidance system 700 is intended to illustrate a number ofapproaches, or network configurations, by which user equipment devicesand sources of content and guidance data may communicate with each otherfor the purpose of accessing content and providing media guidance. Theembodiments described herein may be applied in any one or a subset ofthese approaches, or in a system employing other approaches fordelivering content and providing media guidance. The following fourapproaches provide specific illustrations of the generalized example ofFIG. 7.

In one approach, user equipment devices may communicate with each otherwithin a home network. User equipment devices can communicate with eachother directly via short-range point-to-point communication schemesdescribed above, via indirect paths through a hub or other similardevice provided on a home network, or via communications network 714.Each of the multiple individuals in a single home may operate differentuser equipment devices on the home network. As a result, it may bedesirable for various media guidance information or settings to becommunicated between the different user equipment devices. For example,it may be desirable for users to maintain consistent media guidanceapplication settings on different user equipment devices within a homenetwork, as described in greater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. PatentPublication No. 2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005. Different types ofuser equipment devices in a home network may also communicate with eachother to transmit content. For example, a user may transmit content fromuser computer equipment to a portable video player or portable musicplayer.

In a second approach, users may have multiple types of user equipment bywhich they access content and obtain media guidance. For example, someusers may have home networks that are accessed by in-home and mobiledevices. Users may control in-home devices via a media guidanceapplication implemented on a remote device. For example, users mayaccess an online media guidance application on a website via a personalcomputer at their office, or a mobile device such as a PDA orweb-enabled mobile telephone. The user may set various settings (e.g.,recordings, reminders, or other settings) on the online guidanceapplication to control the user's in-home equipment. The online guidemay control the user's equipment directly, or by communicating with amedia guidance application on the user's in-home equipment. Varioussystems and methods for user equipment devices communicating, where theuser equipment devices are in locations remote from each other, isdiscussed in, for example, Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 8,046,801, issuedOct. 25, 2011, which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in itsentirety.

In a third approach, users of user equipment devices inside and outsidea home can use their media guidance application to communicate directlywith content source 716 to access content. Specifically, within a home,users of user television equipment 702 and user computer equipment 704may access the media guidance application to navigate among and locatedesirable content. Users may also access the media guidance applicationoutside of the home using wireless user communications devices 706 tonavigate among and locate desirable content.

In a fourth approach, user equipment devices may operate in a cloudcomputing environment to access cloud services. In a cloud computingenvironment, various types of computing services for content sharing,storage or distribution (e.g., video sharing sites or social networkingsites) are provided by a collection of network-accessible computing andstorage resources, referred to as “the cloud.” For example, the cloudcan include a collection of server computing devices, which may belocated centrally or at distributed locations, that provide cloud-basedservices to various types of users and devices connected via a networksuch as the Internet via communications network 714. These cloudresources may include one or more content sources 716 and one or moremedia guidance data sources 718. In addition or in the alternative, theremote computing sites may include other user equipment devices, such asuser television equipment 702, user computer equipment 704, and wirelessuser communications device 706. For example, the other user equipmentdevices may provide access to a stored copy of a video or a streamedvideo. In such embodiments, user equipment devices may operate in apeer-to-peer manner without communicating with a central server.

The cloud provides access to services, such as content storage, contentsharing, or social networking services, among other examples, as well asaccess to any content described above, for user equipment devices.Services can be provided in the cloud through cloud computing serviceproviders, or through other providers of online services. For example,the cloud-based services can include a content storage service, acontent sharing site, a social networking site, or other services viawhich user-sourced content is distributed for viewing by others onconnected devices. These cloud-based services may allow a user equipmentdevice to store content to the cloud and to receive content from thecloud rather than storing content locally and accessing locally-storedcontent.

A user may use various content capture devices, such as camcorders,digital cameras with video mode, audio recorders, mobile phones, andhandheld computing devices, to record content. The user can uploadcontent to a content storage service on the cloud either directly, forexample, from user computer equipment 704 or wireless usercommunications device 706 having content capture feature. Alternatively,the user can first transfer the content to a user equipment device, suchas user computer equipment 704. The user equipment device storing thecontent uploads the content to the cloud using a data transmissionservice on communications network 714. In some embodiments, the userequipment device itself is a cloud resource, and other user equipmentdevices can access the content directly from the user equipment deviceon which the user stored the content.

Cloud resources may be accessed by a user equipment device using, forexample, a web browser, a media guidance application, a desktopapplication, a mobile application, and/or any combination of accessapplications of the same. The user equipment device may be a cloudclient that relies on cloud computing for application delivery, or theuser equipment device may have some functionality without access tocloud resources. For example, some applications running on the userequipment device may be cloud applications, i.e., applications deliveredas a service over the Internet, while other applications may be storedand run on the user equipment device. In some embodiments, a user devicemay receive content from multiple cloud resources simultaneously. Forexample, a user device can stream audio from one cloud resource whiledownloading content from a second cloud resource. Or a user device candownload content from multiple cloud resources for more efficientdownloading. In some embodiments, user equipment devices can use cloudresources for processing operations such as the processing operationsperformed by processing circuitry described in relation to FIG. 6.

FIG. 8 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for identifying amedia asset based on an ambiguous search indicator provided by a user,in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. Process 800 maybe executed by control circuitry 604 (e.g., in a manner instructed tocontrol circuitry 604 by the media guidance application). Controlcircuitry 604 may be part of user equipment (e.g., user equipment 106,which may have the functionality of any or all of user televisionequipment 702, user computer equipment 704, and/or wirelesscommunications device 706), or of a remote server separated from theuser equipment by way of communications network 714.

Process 800 begins at 802, where control circuitry 604 captures, at afirst time instance, from an environment where a user is present, anaudio recording. For example, control circuitry 604 engages an audiorecorder, via I/O path 604 in FIG. 6, to periodically, intermittently orperiodically record ambient audio content from the environment. At 804,control circuitry 604 identifies, from the audio recording, a tunehaving audio characteristics that match with vocal characteristics ofthe user, wherein the tune includes a plurality of tones. At 806,control circuitry 604, in response to identifying the tune, generates afrequency domain representation of the plurality of tones. For example,control circuitry 604 transforms the audio recording to the frequencydomain to extract audio signals that have the user vocalcharacteristics. At 808, control circuitry 604 transmits a query basedon the generated frequency domain representation to a music database,e.g., at storage 608 in FIG. 6, or data source 716 in FIG. 7. At 810,when the music is identified in response to the query, process 800 mayend. When the music is unidentified in response to the query, process800 proceeds to 812, where control circuitry 604 receives a resultindicating a failure to find a match in the music database based on thegenerated frequency domain representation.

At 812, control circuitry 604 retrieves, from a profile of the user, alocation history of the user and an application usage historycorresponding to the user within a pre-defined duration of time prior tothe first time instance. For example, control circuitry 604 sends arequest to a user device, via the I/O path 604 I FIG. 6 to retrieve thelocation history of the user device. At 816, control circuitry 604identifies, from the location history, a first location where the userwas present during a first period of time within the pre-definedduration of time. Further description of identifying the first locationis provided in FIG. 9. At 818, control circuitry 604 determines a sourceof a media asset available at the first location during the first periodof time, which is further described in FIG. 10. At 820, controlcircuitry 604 retrieves content of a first media asset transmitted fromthe source of media asset during the first period of time. At 822,control circuitry 604 determines whether the user was exposed to theretrieved content of the media asset based at least in part on userapplication usage history from a user device, as further described inFIG. 11.

At 824, in response to determining that the user was not exposed to theretrieved content of the media asset, process 800 may end, or proceed toprocess another media asset or another location the user was present at.At 804, in response to determining that the user was exposed to theretrieved content of the media asset, process 800 proceeds to 826, wherecontrol circuitry 604 determines a first plurality of music tunestransmitted with the content of the first media asset. At 828, controlcircuitry 604 compares the frequency domain representation of theplurality of tones with each music tune of the first plurality of musictunes to generate a respective similarity metric. At 830, when thesimilarity metric is greater than a similarity threshold, controlcircuitry 604 identifies the respective music tune from the first mediaasset corresponds to the audio recording from the user, e.g., at 832. At834, control circuitry 604 generates for display a recommendation of thefirst media asset featuring the respective music tune. For example,control circuitry 604 generates for display, via the display circuitry612 in FIG. 6, recommended media assets 108 a-b shown in FIG. 1, or 303a-c shown in FIG. 3.

FIG. 9 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for identifyingfrom a location history a location where the user is likely to beexposed to a media asset (e.g., see 816 in FIG. 8), in accordance withsome embodiments of the disclosure. Process 900 may be executed bycontrol circuitry 604 (e.g., in a manner instructed to control circuitry604 by the media guidance application). Control circuitry 604 may bepart of user equipment (e.g., user equipment 106, user televisionequipment 702, user computer equipment 704, and/or wirelesscommunications device 706), or of a remote server separated from theuser equipment by way of communications network 714.

Process 900 begins at 902, where control circuitry 604 identifies, froma location history, a plurality of locations that the user has beenpresent at during the pre-defined duration of time. At 904, controlcircuitry 604 determines a first subset of the plurality of locationsfor locations that the user was present at for more than a thresholdamount of time. For example, control circuitry 604 filters the pluralityof locations where the user was present by the threshold amount of time,e.g., 10 minutes, etc. At 906, for each location from the first subset,control circuitry 604 performs 908-920 as below. At 908, controlcircuitry 604 determines a type of the respective location. For example,control circuitry 604 queries a location database, e.g., at storage 608in FIG. 6, based on an identifier of the location (e.g., GPScoordinates, street address, a business name, etc.).

At 910, if the type of the location is likely to provide exposure ofmedia assets, e.g., an indoor venue such as a restaurant, a trainstation, a club, etc., process 900 proceeds to 912, where controlcircuitry 604 identifies the respective location as a candidate for thefirst location. At 910, if the type of the location is unlikely toprovide exposure of media assets, e.g., an outdoor venue such as anational park, a hiking trail, etc., process 900 proceeds to 914, wherecontrol circuitry 604 searches the application usage history for anapplication usage record corresponding to a respective time period whenthe user was present at the respective location. At 916, controlcircuitry 604 determines whether the application usage record relates tomedia content delivery. For example, control circuitry 604 queries anapplication database, e.g., t storage 608 in FIG. 6 to determine whethereach application can be used for media content delivery, e.g., astreaming application, a digital radio application, a gamingapplication, etc. At 918, when the application usage record indicatesthe application used is related to content delivery, process 900proceeds to 920, where control circuitry 604 associates a media assetthat is indicated by the application usage record with the respectivelocation. Otherwise, when the application usage record indicates theapplication used is unrelated to content delivery, process 900 ends.

FIG. 10 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for determining amedia source available at a location during the time when the user waspresent at the location (e.g., see 818 in FIG. 8), in accordance withsome embodiments of the disclosure. Process 1000 may be executed bycontrol circuitry 604 (e.g., in a manner instructed to control circuitry604 by the media guidance application). Control circuitry 604 may bepart of user equipment (e.g., user equipment 106, user televisionequipment 702, user computer equipment 704, and/or wirelesscommunications device 706), or of a remote server separated from theuser equipment by way of communications network 714.

Process 1000 begins at 1002, where control circuitry 604 transmits, to aserver, e.g., data source 718 via communications network 714 in FIG. 7,a query for a record of social media activities relating to the userwithin a past period of time. At 1004, control circuitry 604, inresponse to obtaining the record of social media activities relating tothe user, searches the record of social media activities for a subset ofsocial media activities that occurred at the first location, e.g., witha search query term of “science club.” At 1006, for each social mediaactivity from the subset, control circuitry 604 performs 1008-1012 asbelow. At 1008, control circuitry extracts one or more keywords from therespective social media activity, e.g., “watching,” “Big Bang Theory,”etc. (see 202-203 in FIG. 2). At 1010, control circuitry 604 searches apast transmission schedule across a plurality of media sources at arespective time corresponding to the respective social media activitybased on the one or more keywords. For example, control circuitry 604obtains the past transmission schedule data from data source 718 viacommunications network 714 in FIG. 7. At 1012, in response toidentifying a media asset from a media source from the past transmissionschedule matches the one or more keywords, control circuitry 604determines that the media source is available at the first location,e.g., the television channel that broadcasts the show “Big Bang Theory”is available at the location “science club,” as described in FIG. 2.

FIG. 11 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for determiningwhether the user was exposed to a media asset when the media asset wasdisplayed at a location where the user was present (e.g., see 822 inFIG. 8), in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. Process1100 may be executed by control circuitry 604 (e.g., in a mannerinstructed to control circuitry 604 by the media guidance application).Control circuitry 604 may be part of user equipment (e.g., userequipment 106, user television equipment 702, user computer equipment704, and/or wireless communications device 706), or of a remote serverseparated from the user equipment by way of communications network 714.

Process 1100 begins at 1102, where control circuitry 604 searches theapplication usage history for one or more application usage recordscorresponding to the first period of time when the user was present atthe first location. At 1104, when at least one application was activelyused during the time when the user was present at the location, e.g.,“science club,” process 1100 proceeds to 1106, where control circuitry604 determines an application type, an application usage status and anapplication usage time duration for each of the one or more applicationusage records. At 1108, control circuitry 604 searches, an applicationusage table, for a distraction score corresponding to each applicationtype, e.g., as shown in Table 1. At 1110, control circuitry 604 computesa distraction metric based on the distraction score corresponding toeach application type, the respective application usage status and therespective application usage time duration. At 1112, when the computeddistraction metric is greater than a distraction threshold, controlcircuitry 604 determines that the user was not exposed to the retrievedcontent of the media asset at 1114. Otherwise, when the computerdistraction is no greater than the distraction threshold, process 900proceeds to 826 in FIG. 8.

FIG. 12 depicts an illustrative flowchart of a process for identifying amedia asset in response to a user humming based on social influence fromanother user, in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure.Process 1200 may be executed by control circuitry 604 (e.g., in a mannerinstructed to control circuitry 604 by the media guidance application).Control circuitry 604 may be part of user equipment (e.g., userequipment 106, user television equipment 702, user computer equipment704, and/or wireless communications device 706), or of a remote serverseparated from the user equipment by way of communications network 714.

Process 1200 begins at 1202, where control circuitry 604 determineswhether a social connection of the user has been co-located at the samelocation with the user during the pre-defined duration of time based onthe location history of the user and a social media activity at the samelocation. For example, in response to determining that no media asset isfound corresponding to the tune from the user at 830 in FIG. 8, controlcircuitry 604 queries the social media activity history of the user,e.g., from storage 608 in FIG. 6 or data source 718 in FIG. 7, based ona first user identifier for the user and a second user identifier forthe social connection of the user. At 1204, if control circuitry 604identifies that a social connection is co-located at the same locationwith the user, process 1200 proceeds to 1206, where control circuitry604 obtains, from a server, e.g., data source 718 in FIG. 7, a locationhistory of the social connection and an application usage history of thesocial connection prior to a time when the social connection and theuser were co-located at the same location. At 1208, control circuitry604 determines a second media asset that the social connection wasexposed to, based on the location history of the social connection andthe application usage history of the social connection. At 1210, controlcircuitry 604 determines a second plurality of music tunes transmittedwith the content of the second media asset. At 1212, control circuitry604 compares the frequency domain representation of the plurality oftones with each music tune of the second plurality of music tunes todetermine whether the tune corresponds to the second media asset. Inthis way, control circuitry 604.

It should be noted that processes 800-1200 or any step thereof could beperformed on, or provided by, any of the devices shown in, or describedwith respect to, FIGS. 1-3 and 6-7. For example, any of processes800-1200 may be executed by control circuitry 604 (FIG. 6) as instructedby control circuitry implemented on user equipment 106 (FIG. 1), 702,704, 706 (FIG. 6), and/or the like for generating and displaying asummary view of a media asset. In addition, one or more steps ofprocesses 800-1200 may be incorporated into or combined with one or moresteps of any other process or embodiment.

It is contemplated that the actions or descriptions of each of FIGS.8-12 may be used with any other embodiment of this disclosure. Inaddition, the actions and descriptions described in relation to FIGS.8-12 may be done in alternative orders or in parallel to further thepurposes of this disclosure. For example, each of these steps may beperformed in any order or in parallel or substantially simultaneously toreduce lag or increase the speed of the system or method. Furthermore,it should be noted that any of the devices or equipment discussed inrelation to FIGS. 1-12 could be used to perform one or more of theactions in FIGS. 8-12.

It will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art that methodsinvolved in the present disclosure may be embodied in a computer programproduct that includes a computer-usable and/or readable medium. Forexample, such a computer-usable medium may consist of a read-only memorydevice, such as a CD-ROM disk or conventional ROM device, or a randomaccess memory, such as a hard drive device or a computer diskette,having a computer-readable program code stored thereon. It should alsobe understood that methods, techniques, and processes involved in thepresent disclosure may be executed using processing circuitry. Forinstance, determining a source of media assets available at a locationthat the user was present at (see 818 in FIG. 8), e.g., by processingcircuitry 606 of FIG. 6. The processing circuitry, for instance, may bea general purpose processor, a customized integrated circuit (e.g., anASIC), or a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) within user equipment600, media content source 716, or media guidance data source 718. Forexample, the attributes of media assets, may be stored in, and retrievedfrom, storage 608 of FIG. 6, or media guidance data source 718 of FIG.7. Furthermore, processing circuitry, or a computer program, may updateconfiguration data of the media guidance application, which may bestored within storage 608 of FIG. 6 or media guidance data source 718 ofFIG. 7.

The processes discussed above are intended to be illustrative and notlimiting. One skilled in the art would appreciate that the steps of theprocesses discussed herein may be omitted, modified, combined, and/orrearranged, and any additional steps may be performed without departingfrom the scope of the invention. More generally, the above disclosure ismeant to be exemplary and not limiting. Only the claims that follow aremeant to set bounds as to what the present invention includes.Furthermore, it should be noted that the features and limitationsdescribed in any one embodiment may be applied to any other embodimentherein, and flowcharts or examples relating to one embodiment may becombined with any other embodiment in a suitable manner, done indifferent orders, or done in parallel. In addition, the systems andmethods described herein may be performed in real time. It should alsobe noted, the systems and/or methods described above may be applied to,or used in accordance with, other systems and/or methods.

While some portions of this disclosure may make reference to“convention,” any such reference is merely for the purpose of providingcontext to the invention(s) of the instant disclosure, and does not formany admission as to what constitutes the state of the art.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method for identifying a media asset based onan ambiguous search indicator provided by a user, the method comprising:capturing, at a first time instance, from an environment where a user ispresent, an audio recording; identifying, from the audio recording, atune having audio characteristics that match with vocal characteristicsof the user, wherein the tune includes a plurality of tones; in responseto identifying the tune, generating a frequency domain representation ofthe plurality of tones; transmitting a query based on the generatedfrequency domain representation to a music database; in response tobased on the query, receiving a result indicating a failure to find amatch in the music database based on the generated frequency domainrepresentation: retrieving, from a profile of the user, a locationhistory of the user and an application usage history corresponding tothe user within a pre-defined duration of time prior to the first timeinstance; identifying, from the location history, a first location wherethe user was present during a first period of time within thepre-defined duration of time; determining a source of a media assetavailable at the first location during the first period of time;retrieving content of a first media asset transmitted from the source ofmedia asset during the first period of time; determining whether theuser was exposed to the retrieved content of the media asset based atleast in part on user application usage history from a user device; inresponse to determining that the user was exposed to the retrievedcontent of the first media asset: determining a first plurality of musictunes transmitted with the content of the first media asset; comparingthe frequency domain representation of the plurality of tones with eachmusic tune of the first plurality of music tunes to generate arespective similarity metric; in response to determining that therespective similarity metric is greater than a similarity threshold,identifying the respective music tune from the first media assetcorresponds to the audio recording from the user; and generating fordisplay a recommendation of the first media asset featuring therespective music tune.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein theidentifying, from the audio recording, the tune having audiocharacteristics that match with vocal characteristics of the usercomprises: extracting a set of mono signals from the audio recording;for each mono signal from the set of mono signals: generating a set ofaudio characteristics corresponding to the mono signal, wherein the setof audio characteristics includes any of mel-frequency cepstralcoefficients (MFCC) and perceptual linear prediction relative spectra(PLP-RASTA); retrieving, from the profile of the user, a set of vocalcharacteristics; comparing each characteristic of the set of audiocharacteristics with a corresponding characteristic from the set ofvocal characteristics that has a same type; determining whether the setof audio characteristics and the set of vocal characteristics overlapfor more than a similarity threshold; and in response to determiningthat the set of audio characteristics and the set of vocalcharacteristics overlap for more than the similarity threshold,identifying the mono signal as a vocal signal from the user.
 3. Themethod of claim 1, wherein the retrieving, from the profile of the user,the location history of the user and an application usage historycorresponding to the user within a pre-defined duration of time prior tothe first time instance comprises: transmitting a query to a device ofthe user for a GPS log and an application usage log within thepre-defined duration of time prior to the first time instance; inresponse to the query, obtaining the GPS log from the device of theuser; in response to receiving a notification that the GPS log isunavailable, transmitting, to a server, a query for a record of socialmedia activities relating to the user within the predefined durationprior to the first time instance; in response to the query for therecord of social media activities, searching the record of social mediaactivities relating to the user for a first subset of social mediaactivities, each social media activity from the subset identifying alocation; and storing the first subset of social media activities andcorresponding locations as part of the location history.
 4. The methodof claim 3, further comprising: in response to receiving a notificationthat the application usage history is unavailable from the device of theuser: searching the record of social media activities relating to theuser for a second subset of social media activities, each social mediaactivity from the second subset indicates that the user is using arespective application; and storing the second subset of social mediaactivities and information relating to respective applications as partof the application usage history.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein theidentifying, from the location history, the first location where theuser was present during the first period of time within the pre-definedduration of time comprises: identifying, from a location history, aplurality of locations that the user has been present at during thepre-defined duration of time; determining a first subset of theplurality of locations for locations that the user was present at formore than a threshold amount of time; for each location from the firstsubset: determining a type of the respective location; in response todetermining that the respective location is of a type that is likely toprovide media transmission to the user, identifying the respectivelocation as a candidate for the first location; in response todetermining that the respective location is of a type that is unlikelyto provide media transmission to the user: searching the applicationusage history for an application usage record corresponding to arespective time period when the user was present at the respectivelocation; determining whether the application usage record relates tomedia content delivery; in response to determining that the applicationusage record relates to media content delivery, associating a mediaasset that is indicated by the application usage record with therespective location.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein the determiningthe source of the media asset available at the first location during thefirst period of time comprises: transmitting, to a server, a query for arecord of social media activities relating to the user within a pastperiod of time; in response to obtaining the record of social mediaactivities relating to the user, search the record of social mediaactivities for a subset of social media activities that occurred at thefirst location; for each social media activity from the subset:extracting one or more keywords from the respective social mediaactivity; searching a past transmission schedule across a plurality ofmedia sources at a respective time corresponding to the respectivesocial media activity based on the one or more keywords; in response toidentifying a media asset from a media source from the past transmissionschedule matches the one or more keywords, determining that the mediasource is available at the first location.
 7. The method of claim 1,wherein the determining whether the user was exposed to the retrievedcontent of the media asset based at least in part on the applicationusage history from the user device comprises: searching the applicationusage history for one or more application usage records corresponding tothe first period of time when the user was present at the firstlocation; in response to identifying the one or more application usagerecords: determining an application type, an application usage statusand an application usage time duration for each of the one or moreapplication usage records; searching, an application usage table, for adistraction score corresponding to each application type; computing adistraction metric based on the distraction score corresponding to eachapplication type, the respective application usage status and therespective application usage time duration; and in response todetermining that the distraction metric is higher than a distractionthreshold, determining that the user was not exposed to the retrievedcontent of the media asset.
 8. The method of claim 1, wherein thedetermining the plurality of music tunes transmitted with the content ofthe first media asset comprises: retrieving metadata associated with thefirst media asset; in response to determining that the metadata includesinformation relating to a theme song: transmitting a query to a musicdatabase based on a title of the theme song; and in response to thequery, obtaining an audio asset of the theme song and generating a tunefor the audio asset; and in response to determining that the metadataincludes no information relating to any theme song, performing audioanalysis of the first media asset to generate the plurality of musictunes.
 9. The method of claim 1, further comprising: in response toretrieving, from the profile of the user, the application usage historycorresponding to the user within the pre-defined duration of time priorto the first time instance: for each application from the applicationusage history, determining whether the respective application deliversmedia content to the user by search an application inventory based on arespective application identifier; in response to determining that therespective application delivers media content to the user: determining atype of media content that the respective application delivers; inresponse to determining that the respective application provides livetransmission of media content, identifying a media asset that wastransmitted via the respective application during the pre-definedduration of time as a candidate for the first media asset; in responseto determining that the respective application provides an on-demandmedia asset, identifying the on-demand media asset as the candidate forthe first media asset; and in response to determining that therespective application provides a gaming application, querying, a gamingdatabase, for an audio signature of tunes used in the gaming applicationbased on a name of the gaming application.
 10. The method of claim 1,further comprising: in response to determining that the respectivesimilarity metric is lower than a similarity threshold: determiningwhether a social connection of the user has been co-located at a samelocation with the user during the pre-defined duration of time based onthe location history of the user and a social media activity at the samelocation; in response to determining that the social connection of theuser has been co-located at the same location with the user: obtaining,from a server, a location history of the social connection and anapplication usage history of the social connection prior to a time whenthe social connection and the user were co-located at the same location;determining a second media asset that the social connection was exposedto based on the location history of the social connection and theapplication usage history of the social connection; determining a secondplurality of music tunes transmitted with the content of the secondmedia asset; and comparing the frequency domain representation of theplurality of tones with each music tune of the second plurality of musictunes to determine whether the tune corresponds to the second mediaasset.
 11. A system for identifying a media asset based on an ambiguoussearch indicator provided by a user, the system comprising: memory; andcontrol circuitry configured to: capture, at a first time instance, froman environment where a user is present, an audio recording; identify,from the audio recording, a tune having audio characteristics that matchwith vocal characteristics of the user, wherein the tune includes aplurality of tones; in response to identifying the tune, generate afrequency domain representation of the plurality of tones; transmit aquery based on the generated frequency domain representation to a musicdatabase; in response to based on the query, receiving a resultindicating a failure to find a match in the music database based on thegenerated frequency domain representation: retrieve, from a profile ofthe user, a location history of the user and an application usagehistory corresponding to the user within a pre-defined duration of timeprior to the first time instance; identify, from the location history, afirst location where the user was present during a first period of timewithin the pre-defined duration of time; determine a source of a mediaasset available at the first location during the first period of time;retrieve content of a first media asset transmitted from the source ofmedia asset during the first period of time; determine whether the userwas exposed to the retrieved content of the media asset based at leastin part on user application usage history from a user device; inresponse to determining that the user was exposed to the retrievedcontent of the first media asset: determine a first plurality of musictunes transmitted with the content of the first media asset; compare thefrequency domain representation of the plurality of tones with eachmusic tune of the first plurality of music tunes to generate arespective similarity metric; in response to determining that therespective similarity metric is greater than a similarity threshold,identify the respective music tune from the first media assetcorresponds to the audio recording from the user; and generate fordisplay a recommendation of the first media asset featuring therespective music tune.
 12. The system of claim 11, wherein the controlcircuitry is further configured, when identifying, from the audiorecording, the tune having audio characteristics that match with vocalcharacteristics of the user, to: extract a set of mono signals from theaudio recording; for each mono signal from the set of mono signals:generate a set of audio characteristics corresponding to the monosignal, wherein the set of audio characteristics includes any ofmel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC) and perceptual linearprediction relative spectra (PLP-RASTA); retrieve, from the profile ofthe user, a set of vocal characteristics; compare each characteristic ofthe set of audio characteristics with a corresponding characteristicfrom the set of vocal characteristics that has a same type; determinewhether the set of audio characteristics and the set of vocalcharacteristics overlap for more than a similarity threshold; and inresponse to determining that the set of audio characteristics and theset of vocal characteristics overlap for more than the similaritythreshold, identify the mono signal as a vocal signal from the user. 13.The system of claim 11, wherein the control circuitry is furtherconfigured, when retrieving, from the profile of the user, the locationhistory of the user and an application usage history corresponding tothe user within a pre-defined duration of time prior to the first timeinstance, to: transmit a query to a device of the user for a GPS log andan application usage log within the pre-defined duration of time priorto the first time instance; in response to the query, obtain the GPS logfrom the device of the user; in response to receiving a notificationthat the GPS log is unavailable, transmit, to a server, a query for arecord of social media activities relating to the user within thepredefined duration prior to the first time instance; in response to thequery for the record of social media activities, search the record ofsocial media activities relating to the user for a first subset ofsocial media activities, each social media activity from the subsetidentifying a location; and store the first subset of social mediaactivities and corresponding locations as part of the location history.14. The system of claim 13, wherein the control circuitry is furtherconfigured to: in response to receiving a notification that theapplication usage history is unavailable from the device of the user:search the record of social media activities relating to the user for asecond subset of social media activities, each social media activityfrom the second subset indicates that the user is using a respectiveapplication; and store the second subset of social media activities andinformation relating to respective applications as part of theapplication usage history.
 15. The system of claim 11, wherein thecontrol circuitry is further configured, when identifying, from thelocation history, the first location where the user was present duringthe first period of time within the pre-defined duration of time, to:identify, from a location history, a plurality of locations that theuser has been present at during the pre-defined duration of time;determine a first subset of the plurality of locations for locationsthat the user was present at for more than a threshold amount of time;for each location from the first subset: determine a type of therespective location; in response to determining that the respectivelocation is of a type that is likely to provide media transmission tothe user, identify the respective location as a candidate for the firstlocation; in response to determining that the respective location is ofa type that is unlikely to provide media transmission to the user:search the application usage history for an application usage recordcorresponding to a respective time period when the user was present atthe respective location; determine whether the application usage recordrelates to media content delivery; in response to determining that theapplication usage record relates to media content delivery, associate amedia asset that is indicated by the application usage record with therespective location.
 16. The system of claim 11, wherein the controlcircuitry is further configured, when determining the source of themedia asset available at the first location during the first period oftime, to: transmit, to a server, a query for a record of social mediaactivities relating to the user within a past period of time; inresponse to obtaining the record of social media activities relating tothe user, search the record of social media activities for a subset ofsocial media activities that occurred at the first location; for eachsocial media activity from the subset: extract one or more keywords fromthe respective social media activity; search a past transmissionschedule across a plurality of media sources at a respective timecorresponding to the respective social media activity based on the oneor more keywords; in response to identifying a media asset from a mediasource from the past transmission schedule matches the one or morekeywords, determine that the media source is available at the firstlocation.
 17. The system of claim 11, wherein the control circuitry isfurther configured, when determining whether the user was exposed to theretrieved content of the media asset based at least in part on theapplication usage history from the user device, to: search theapplication usage history for one or more application usage recordscorresponding to the first period of time when the user was present atthe first location; in response to identifying the one or moreapplication usage records: determine an application type, an applicationusage status and an application usage time duration for each of the oneor more application usage records; search, an application usage table,for a distraction score corresponding to each application type; computea distraction metric based on the distraction score corresponding toeach application type, the respective application usage status and therespective application usage time duration; and in response todetermining that the distraction metric is higher than a distractionthreshold, determine that the user was not exposed to the retrievedcontent of the media asset.
 18. The system of claim 11, wherein thecontrol circuitry is further configured, when determining the pluralityof music tunes transmitted with the content of the first media asset,to: retrieve metadata associated with the first media asset; in responseto determining that the metadata includes information relating to atheme song: transmit a query to a music database based on a title of thetheme song; and in response to the query, obtain an audio asset of thetheme song and generating a tune for the audio asset; and in response todetermining that the metadata includes no information relating to anytheme song, perform audio analysis of the first media asset to generatethe plurality of music tunes.
 19. The system of claim 11, wherein thecontrol circuitry is further configured to: in response to retrieving,from the profile of the user, the application usage historycorresponding to the user within the pre-defined duration of time priorto the first time instance: for each application from the applicationusage history, determine whether the respective application deliversmedia content to the user by search an application inventory based on arespective application identifier; in response to determining that therespective application delivers media content to the user: determine atype of media content that the respective application delivers; inresponse to determining that the respective application provides livetransmission of media content, identify a media asset that wastransmitted via the respective application during the pre-definedduration of time as a candidate for the first media asset; in responseto determining that the respective application provides an on-demandmedia asset, identify the on-demand media asset as the candidate for thefirst media asset; and in response to determining that the respectiveapplication provides a gaming application, query, a gaming database, foran audio signature of tunes used in the gaming application based on aname of the gaming application.
 20. The system of claim 11, wherein thecontrol circuitry is further configured to: in response to determiningthat the respective similarity metric is lower than a similaritythreshold: determine whether a social connection of the user has beenco-located at a same location with the user during the pre-definedduration of time based on the location history of the user and a socialmedia activity at the same location; in response to determining that thesocial connection of the user has been co-located at the same locationwith the user: obtain, from a server, a location history of the socialconnection and an application usage history of the social connectionprior to a time when the social connection and the user were co-locatedat the same location; determine a second media asset that the socialconnection was exposed to based on the location history of the socialconnection and the application usage history of the social connection;determine a second plurality of music tunes transmitted with the contentof the second media asset; and compare the frequency domainrepresentation of the plurality of tones with each music tune of thesecond plurality of music tunes to determine whether the tunecorresponds to the second media asset.